Arrangements
by fringeperson
Summary: ONESHOT. COMPLETE. POST SERIES - so there could very well be spoilers. DON'T OWN CHARAS. They caught up every year, always somewhere different. Last year, Toph hadn't come because she couldn't see in the South Pole. This year, she was hosting.


For some reason, none of them had ever thought of Toph growing up and filling out. Back at the theatre, she'd been played by a muscle bound _man_, and had been so pleased that any lingering thoughts of her being even vaguely feminine abruptly fell away. Zuko remembered talking to her at the time about the play. He'd said to her at the time, "You get a muscley version of yourself, taking down ten bad guys at once, and making sassy remarks." Her response was "Yeah, that's pretty great."

Perhaps it was understandable that thinking of her as a girl, as feminine, became very difficult after that. Even through her moments of sensitivity, those brief glimmers of kindness, she then went and destroyed it by punching someone in the shoulder, because she didn't do hugs.

Yet there she stood at the entrance to the BeiFong estate, welcoming all of them into her parent's house for their yearly reunion, just seven years on from Ozai's defeat. She had been absent from the previous get-together, but they had kind of expected that, since it had been Katara and Sokka's turn to host, which meant the South Pole, which meant ice, which meant that Toph would have been double blind. She had sent them a letter though, saying that she was busy keeping her parents from arranging a marriage for her, but was otherwise well.

At the time, once they got over the shock of Toph possibly being forced into an arranged marriage, Suki, Sokka, Aang, Katara, Zuko, Mai and Ty Lee had laughed at the idea of her being anybody's demure and blushing bride. Faced with the transformation before them now, however, it was the grand masters from the White Lotus Society who were smiling in quiet amusement at their young friends and their dropped jaws.

"Hey, where are Mai and Ty Lee?" Toph asked once she had welcomed everybody in.

Zuko picked up his jaw and got over his shock at the way Toph looked now to answer. "They ran off to the circus together, we haven't heard from them since last year," he ground out. It was still a slightly sore topic with him.

"Ouch, sorry to hear that," she offered, recognising that she had brought up something that had the potential to make the somewhat moody Fire Lord clam up and shut himself away for a while.

"Appreciated."

"Hey man, it could have been worse," Sokka pointed out. "She could have married you and _then_ left."

"Not helping Sokka," Suki pointed out, jabbing him in the ribs with her elbow.

"Oh, right... sorry man."

"Toph?" called a female voice from just beyond one door as the blind girl led her friends to the entertaining room.

Toph quickly opened the door to let her guests through before answering.

"Yes mother?"

"Do not forget that you have an interview with a suitor tonight my dear. You will need to change before he comes," the older woman said, peering out from behind her screen door to remind her child of her other commitments.

"I asked you, very politely I thought, to _not_ set up _any_ dates while I have guests. It would be impolite for me to not have dinner with them while they are visiting me!" Toph raged quietly, hoping to keep it down so that none of her friends heard.

"I'm sure they will all be too tired after their journeys to want to dine formally tonight, Toph dear," her mother said gently, trying to coax her daughter into behaving. It was getting harder every day now since Toph had first been returned to them.

"Formal dining wasn't the idea in the first place. Just a large, filling dinner with friends while we talked about how the year had been for each of us. I can't believe how – argh!" Toph had just lost her temper with her mother. As quietly as possible. "You know what? Forget it. When whoever _you've_ invited shows up, show him to the gardens where I will be entertaining _my_ guests."

"Oh dear," murmured Lady BeiFong quietly as she watched her daughter leave in an undignified huff, then compose herself at the door before joining her friends.

"My dear Toph, is there trouble in paradise?" Iroh asked, offering her a cup of tea.

"How would I know?" she answered, raising a brow as she accepted the cup.

"Ah, I see," commented the old man, stroking his beard. "Would you like to practice your bending in the garden perhaps? A friendly spar might help you to relax."

Toph laughed. "I have been doing some landscaping since I got home," she admitted. "Anybody else want to come?" Toph asked the rest of the assembled friends. Smiles, nods, and affirmations all around were her answer. "I'll call the maids to bring lemonade for everybody, and we can go out to the garden."

Hours passed as Toph and her friends declared challenges to each other, fought, won and lost, and enjoyed lemonade together. She was just engaged in a fight against Zuko when she felt her mother's footsteps, as well as a stranger's, enter the gardens. Must be tonight's prospective suitor. Jumping over his swords and rolling away from a flame he sent her way, Toph knocked the Fire Lord onto his face and pulled a blanket of earth over him.

"You're getting better," she commented as she squatted down in front of his face.

"Maybe, but you still won," Zuko said. "Can I be let up now?"

Toph laughed and bent the dirt away, every last grain, so that he was as clean as he had been before she trounced him, then she offered him a hand up, which he took.

"Toph!" called Lady BeiFong.

Toph sighed. "Please excuse me, I will be back as soon as possible."

Once she and Zuko were out of the makeshift sparring ring, Suki asked Master Pian Dow for a round, which promised to keep all the friends entertained for a while.

"So who're you?" Toph asked the interloper standing beside her mother.

"My name is Somi FaTen, Miss BeiFong," answered the man, slightly affronted at her deliberately uncouth manner.

"Are you a bender?" Toph asked.

"I don't see how that has anything to do with -" he started, clearly even more offended.

"It's a yes or no question FaTen," Toph interrupted, impatiently.

"No, Miss BeiFong."

"There, that wasn't so hard," she said. "Now, did you see my little spar with Fire Lord Zuko over there?" Toph continued casually, waving in the direction of her friends.

"Yes, Miss Beifong."

"Are you aware that I am blind?"

"Yes, Miss BeiFong."

"Alright, considering that I _am_ blind and female, do you believe that it is alright for me to fight people?"

"No, Miss BeiFong. I think you should be kept safely away from such boorish activities."

Toph restrained herself from growling at the ignorant pompous ass. "This is the last question. What is your house built of? Wood or stone?"

"Wood, Miss BeiFong." The sharp questions were clearly starting to bug the man who Toph just _knew_ thought highly of himself.

"Toph, Lord FaTen is a very important official," Lady BeiFong said, trying to impress upon her daughter that she _must be polite_ to this man, and that offending him like this would simply _not do_.

"Did you miss the bit, Mother, where I pounded the Fire Lord into our lawn? Or where I encased Master Pakku in a cocoon of dirt up to his chin? Did you notice, Mother, that King Bumi is sitting on one of our garden benches and watching a Kyoshi Warrior fight with Master Pian Dow of the Fire Nation? Did it even register to you that I taught the Avatar how to be an earthbender?" Toph demanded, growling. "Ever since Father took ill, you have been even more blind than me!"

Toph took a deep breath and turned to Somi FaTen.

"I have no interest in marrying you, or in seeing you any further. I am going to ask you to leave now, rather than invite you to share a meal with me. If you do _not_ leave of your own will, then _I_ shall earthbend your old, _fat_ butt off the estate myself," Toph said, her blind eyes staring sightlessly at the man before she abruptly turned on her heel. "And yes, I _can_ tell," she added over her shoulder.

"Matchmaking mothers can be very persistent," Iroh observed to Toph quietly when she returned.

"I'm starting to get that," Toph answered glumly.

Zuko was having trouble sleeping, and rather than rolling around in bed ineffectively, he decided it might be better for him to take a walk around the BeiFong garden. He was just approaching a small bridge when he saw a figure in the darkness.

"Hey Zuko, what's keeping you up?" Toph's voice.

Zuko smiled to himself and went to join her, leaning against the side of the bridge next to her and looking up into the black night.

"Not really sure," he answered. "You?"

"I just like walking at night. Everybody is blind in the dark, but I can see just fine. Plus it's quiet, which is nice," Toph said, absently leaning towards Zuko for a little more warmth. The night was starting to get chilly. "I was wondering though, when you all arrived today, you and the gang seemed shocked by something."

"I didn't expect you to have changed so much since the last time I saw you, I'm not sure any of us did," Zuko admitted quietly, scratching the back of his head in embarrassment at being caught out. "I'm so used to you being this tomboy who picks her toes and can earthbend or metalbend anybody and anything into submission. Walking onto your estate and finding out you'd become... well, so beautiful, it was a shock to the system. Then you were still _you_ under all that gorgeousness, and I... I just don't know what to think."

Toph giggled. Of all the sounds Zuko never thought he would hear from Toph, a giggle was on the top of the list. Toph guffawed, laughed loudly, she sometimes chuckled, but she had never giggled.

"Flattered as I am, my growth spurt is also causing me problems of the connubial variety. Every minor noble in town is suddenly interested in having me join their family. I'd rather run away to the South Pole where I can't see anything," Toph said, leaning back comfortably against the stone.

"Personally I'd rather you ran away to the Fire Nation," Zuko mumbled, but of course Toph heard him.

"What was that Sparky?" Toph asked, leaning in close so that her nose almost touched his.

Zuko wasn't sure how to read the expression on her face, if it was angry or pissed off or only determined that she get an answer.

"We've been friends for a long time, and I like our sparring. I miss you're company more than anybody but my Uncle's, and you're a great person to talk to, and listen to..." Zuko trailed off, officially embarrassed.

"Uncle tells me that the elders want you to take a Fire Lady soon as well," Toph quipped, and noticed that Zuko winced, while his skin got hotter. "When Bumi overheard that, he suggested it might be good politics for you to marry someone from a different nation, to represent your intent for peace. Sounds like arranged marriage stuff to me."

"It probably will be if I don't do something myself soon."

"So do something Sparky -" Toph said, only to have her words cut off by lips against hers.


End file.
